Daniel Chapter 5 Introduction (Daniel 5:1-3)

Kootenai Church

Subscribe

Download

Share

00

Daniel Chapter 6 Initial Introduction (Daniel 6)

00:01

Are we on there we are good morning Welcome to adult Sunday school community church.

00:08

We will be in Daniel chapter 5 Moving right along So let's open in prayer

00:17

Lord your word is such a delight every day to bring us to you

00:23

To show us your mind and your heart for your people and this morning as we look into your word we want to lift you up and honor you and Find new ways to be able to spread your word among the inhabitants of the earth for the world is in turmoil

00:39

But you had not only anticipated it, but you are sovereign over it And so we commit this day to you

00:45

We commit this study to you and we commit the results to you in Jesus name. Amen So we're in Daniel chapter 5 and If you would with me turn to Daniel chapter 5 and We will read the first nine verses

01:12

While you're turning there, I'm just gonna double -check something here. Yeah, I only make it just a little way so we're good

01:19

Daniel chapter 5 Belch is are the king held a great feast for a thousand of his nobles and He was drinking wine in the presence of the thousand when belches are tasted the wine

01:32

He gave orders to bring the gold and silver vessels Which nebuchadnezzar his father had taken out of the temple

01:38

Which was in Jerusalem in order that the king and his nobles his wives and his concubines might drink from them

01:44

Then they brought the gold vessels that had been taken out of the temple the house of God Which was in Jerusalem and the king and his nobles his wives and his concubines drank from them

01:55

They drank the wine and praised the gods of gold and of silver of bronze iron wood and stone

02:02

Suddenly the fingers of a man's hand emerged and began writing Opposite the lampstand on the plaster of the wall of the king's palace and the king saw the back of the hand that did the writing

02:13

Then the king's face grew Grew pale and his thoughts alarmed him and his hip joints went slack and his knees began knocking together

02:22

The king called aloud to bring in the conjurers the Chaldeans and the diviners the king spoke and said to the wise men of Babylon Any man who can read this inscription and explain its interpretation to me

02:33

Will be clothed with purple and have a necklace of gold Around his neck and have authority as third ruler in the kingdom

02:40

Then all the king's wise men came in but they could not read the inscription or make known its interpretation to the king

02:46

Then King Belshazzar was greatly alarmed his face grew even paler and his nobles were perplexed

02:53

So we're gonna be on slide 79 Peter It's not working so we're not going to be on slide 79 we are going to be on the slide blank blank screen

03:06

Which is a good thing I guess so last week we finished off with Daniel chapter 4 and Watched Nebuchadnezzar go from the king

03:16

To an animal and back to the king all under the sovereign hand of God It is most important to remember as I've mentioned numerous times

03:25

And you know have heard that this book is about the sovereignty of God every chapter

03:33

Exudes the sovereignty of God nothing is outside his control nothing

03:40

Eludes him nothing trips the sovereign Lord up and We have to remember that we have to remember that as we're going through this book

03:51

Last week there were some things that were on the slide that I thought might have been interesting We'll see if I can work this thing

04:00

Yeah, it's gonna take a skill. Oh you got to turn this thing on yeah, we'll do that okay, so I'm going the wrong way so last week we talked about The message that is that was given to Nebuchadnezzar about his own demise, and there was just some interesting interesting

04:26

Bits of information that I wanted to show you there's an awful lot of information available to us about Babylon About the history of Babylon we have the

04:35

Babylonian Chronicles. We have Herodotus We have numerous Greek scholars who who wrote in just a few a few hundred years later chronicling the things that happened in Babylon and when we when we looked at Different kings claiming to be king of the world that was common

04:52

And this is exactly this is one of the impressions that was done a cylinder of Cyrus the king who conquered

04:58

Babylon and said he was the king of the world the great legitimate king king of Babylon king of Sumer and Akkad king of the four rims of the earth while we all know that he ruled over an area about the size of Texas Now any

05:11

Texans in here say well, it's huge It is but it's not the whole world But that's what

05:16

Kings would claim, and this was the some impressions artistic impressions of Nebuchadnezzar's dream and then some of the cylinders that we have that we've been able to use to decipher and understand the language of Babylon and that have given great color and Depth to understanding the book of Daniel This is the

05:37

East India House inscription that we talked about last week and then This would have been one artist's rendition of what the city of Babylon looked like The step to Ziggurat and the

05:52

Asgila temple of Marduk to the right of it they erected numerous temples to their false gods

06:00

So now we're going to we're going to look at chapter 5 and we've read the first 10 verses But we will probably get through an introduction and just a few of the verses this morning

06:09

So now begins the chronicle of the fall of Babylon You will notice that there are five kings who succeeded

06:16

Nebuchadnezzar Only Four of them are mentioned in most ancient histories

06:24

Even Josephus in his history of the Jews the antiquities in chapters 10 in chapter 10 conflated

06:31

Nabonidus and Belshazzar so Nabonidus Would be this guy and Belshazzar those two for many many years

06:42

Until the discovery of some of the Babylonian cuneiform inscriptions The name

06:47

Belshazzar didn't appear it appeared in Scripture. Therefore. It's true. By the way, we don't need history

06:53

The scripture is true, but it's always interesting when scripture is maligned for centuries and then some discovery is made and Scriptures confirmed to the last letter and that news isn't nearly as big as the news

07:09

Preceding it that some when some thought scripture was wrong so What we will read here,

07:16

I'm gonna read you something that Josephus wrote in his antiquities he says this but now after the death of never

07:22

Nebuchadnezzar Evel Merodach Every time I ever saw this in Scripture reading the book of Daniel.

07:28

I was thought they were saying Merodach was evil That's actually his name Evel Merodach But now so but now after the death of Nebuchadnezzar Evel Merodach his son succeeded in the kingdom who immediately set

07:41

Jeconiah at Liberty and esteemed him among his most intimate friends He also gave him many presents and made him honorable above the rest of the kings that were in Babylon for his father had not kept faith with Jeconiah when he voluntarily delivered himself up to him with his wives and children and his whole kindred for the sake of his country that it might not be taken by siege and utterly utterly and utterly destroyed

08:05

Josephus continues as we said before and when Evel Merodach was dead after a reign of 18 years nigglaser his nigglaser his son took the government and retained it 40 years and then ended his life and after him the succession in the kingdom came to His son lab

08:21

Sara Dacus who continued in all but nine months and when he was dead it came to Baltasar That's Baltasar Balthasar Who by the

08:31

Babylonians was called Nabodet Nabona Delia's No, he wasn't but we'll find out against him

08:39

Did Cyrus the king of Persia and Darius the king of media made war after the death of Nebuchadnezzar?

08:48

Where are we? There we go. Evil Merodach or Evel Merodach assumed the kingdom the name of the son and immediate successor of Nebuchadnezzar was

08:59

Wasn't was this fellow now Evel Merodach the Babylonian form of the name is Amalou Merodach That is man of Marduk.

09:06

They were named after their gods about 30 contact contract tablets dated in this reign have been found

09:14

Excuse me. They show that Evel Merodach reigned for two years and about five months Josephus got it wrong go figure he is said by Berossus to have conducted his government in a illegal and Improper manner and to have been slain by his sister's brother

09:30

Ner go shower occur who then reigned in his stead Evel Merodach is said in 2nd

09:36

Kings 25 27 through 30 and in the parallel passage in Jeremiah 5 52 31 through 34 to have taken

09:45

Jehoiachin King of Judah from his prison in Babylon where he seems to have Been confined for 37 years and to have clothed him with new garments to have given him a seat above all the other kings and To have allowed him to eat at the king's table all the rest of the days of his life

10:01

It's an undesigned coincidence that may be worthy of mention that the first dated tablet from this reign was written on the 26th of Elo And Jeremiah 52 31 says that Jehoiachin was freed from his prison on the 25th of the same month

10:15

So then Eve Evel Merodach was murdered by Negri Lisa and succeeded by him

10:23

And I'm going through these kings names because What the Lord has done here is he wrote when he when he penned when he had

10:30

Daniel or whoever it was Pen the book of Daniel when we ended with chapter 4 verse 37 a

10:37

Whole bunch of time has passed between that verse and the first verse of chapter 5 and we'll talk about that in a minute so So he was succeeded by Nurgle protect the king is what this man's name means one of the princes of the king of Babylon Who accompanied

10:52

Nebuchadnezzar in his last expedition into Jerusalem so this man was? With Nebuchadnezzar when he took

10:58

Jerusalem this king Another of the princes who bore the title of rab mag which simply means official

11:04

He was one of those who were sent to release Jeremiah from prison Jeremiah 39 13 by the captain of the guard he was a

11:12

Babylonian grandee of high rank from profane history in the inscriptions the son of Nebuchadnezzar and Succeeded him on the throne of Babylon around 559

11:20

He was married to the daughter a daughter of Nebuchadnezzar The ruins of a palace the only one on the right bank of the

11:27

Euphrates bear inscription denoting that it was built By this king so one of the palaces of Babylon was built by this king

11:34

He Was succeeded by his son a mere boy He was murdered after a reign of just nine months by a conspiracy of the nobles one of whom was

11:44

Nabon itis Who many people thought Belshazzar was the same as and was not?

11:51

He was succeeded by Nabon itis Who ascended the vacant throne and reigned for a period of 17 years at the close of which period

11:59

Babylon was taken by Cyrus? Belshazzar who comes into notice in connection with the taking of Babylon was by some

12:08

Supposed to be in the same as Nabon itis who was called Nebuchadnezzar son Daniel 5 11 18 and 22

12:15

Because he had married Nebuchadnezzar's daughter But it is known from the inscriptions that Nabon itis had a son called

12:22

Belshazzar who may have been his father's associate on the throne at the time of the fall of Babylon and who therefore would be the grandson of Nebuchadnezzar the

12:32

Jews only had one word Usually rendered father to represent all of these relationships

12:39

Relationships such as father grandfather or a great -grandfather Sometimes they would say a father's father

12:44

But often when they said father You had to trace the lineage to find out if they were actually talking about the father or the grandfather it could have been either

12:52

Neg release er was succeeded by his son Labashi Marduk history indicates that he was a youth if not a child

12:58

But he only reigned for two or three months before he was murdered. So Labashi Marduk this child may

13:05

I not come to shame was his name Oh Marduk That's what his name meant was the fifth king of the neo -babylonian

13:11

Empire ruling in 556 BC He was the son and successor of Neg release er though Classical authors such as Berossus wrote that he was just a child when he became king

13:21

Babylonian documents indicate that he had been in charge of his own affairs before becoming king Suggesting that he was a young adult a youth an adult youth if you will 18 19 17 to 20 years old probably

13:34

His reign was very short lasting only two to three months and with the latest evidence of neg release are being alive from April 556

13:42

BC and documents dated to a successor Nabonitis appears at June of that same year.

13:48

He led a coup against the king Deposing and killing this young king Labashi Marduk the reason for his usurpation of the throne is unknown

13:57

Berossus only describes the justification as Marduk the young fellow lived in evil ways One possible explanation is that whereas neg release or derived his claim to the throne from having married a daughter of Nebuchadnezzar Labashi market

14:10

Marduk could have also been a son of neg release or by another wife and And the

14:55

Chronicle captures the date that Cyrus took the city as the 16th day of the month of Tishri in Nabonitis is 17th year which translates to Saturday, October 12th 539

15:06

BC Regarding Belshazzar's relationship to Nebuchadnezzar Walvoord in his commentary explains it this way so we have

15:16

Belshazzar mentioned in Daniel, but not mentioned in antiquity until These Chronicles were discovered in the early 1920s so for all these years people were

15:29

Confusing thinking Nabonitis and Belshazzar were the same person they were not and the

15:35

Bible knew that go figure Much has been made of the end reference to Belshazzar's relationship to Nebuchadnezzar Walvoord says who is described as his father in verse 2 when

15:46

Belshazzar tested the wine he gave orders Which is mentioned as his father in verse 2

15:56

Even keel of keel and dealage is is influenced by this to consider Belshazzar a literal son of Nebuchadnezzar This is not entirely impossible

16:04

For as Leopold shows Nabonitis could have married a widow of Nebuchadnezzar who had a son by Nebuchadnezzar That son could have then have been adopted by Nabonitis as a way of strengthening his hold on the throne

16:18

Nabonitis assumed the throne in 556 BC only six years after the death of Nebuchadnezzar Belshazzar was probably at least a teenager when

16:27

Nebuchadnezzar died if he was old enough to be co -regent with Nabonitis in 553 BC and it is thus at least possible that Belshazzar could have been a genuine son of Nebuchadnezzar and that his mother after Nebuchadnezzar's death was married to Nabonitis this however is conjecture

16:44

And it is more natural to consider Belshazzar a son of Nabonitis himself Though as noted earlier his mother could have been

16:52

Nebuchadnezzar's daughter But no one knows for sure although the precise identity of Belshazzar may continue to be debated available facts support

17:01

Daniel's designation of Belshazzar as king and a physical descendant of Nebuchadnezzar the reference to the father may be construed as grandfather as As it has been stated neither in Hebrew nor in Chaldee is there any word for grandfather or grandson forefathers are called fathers or father's fathers

17:22

But a single grandfather or forefather is never called father's father

17:27

But only father so that led to some confusion confusion for many years. Why am

17:32

I going through all this because for centuries? literal critics of the

17:37

Bible Pointed to Daniel chapter 1 as a wrong verse it was wrong

17:43

Because Nabonitis was king there was no Belshazzar. He was never mentioned in any of the ancient

17:49

Chronicles and Folks that's what happens when we believe something other than Scripture first It's the

17:57

Bible first and then we look to history for information to flesh it out Because we don't have the

18:04

Babylonian Chronicles flesh Daniel out in a wonderful way But the scripture said Belshazzar was king and guess who was king and it was finally author

18:14

It was finally the world finally accepted it Belshazzar was king So all of that just to show that it took history 1900 no,

18:24

I guess it would be almost 2 ,600 years to catch up to what we already knew Belshazzar was king

18:30

So verse 1 now we're at verse 1 finally he says Belshazzar the king

18:36

Who really was the king held a great feast for thousands of his nobles and he was drinking wine in the presence of the thousand so now 23 years have elapsed from the end of verse 37 of chapter 4 and the first words of chapter 5 of Course liberalist scholars attacked this verse as we mentioned stating that Nabonitis was the king that succeeded

19:03

The the young man and thus the book of Daniel was mistaken here We have already seen that subsequent discoveries have clearly shown that Nabonitis was the king of Babylon at the time

19:13

But he was often away and his son Belshazzar ruled in his stead in his commentary on the

19:19

Bible Reynolds showers Explains it this way the opening verses of chapter 5 present the reader with two problems first Who was

19:28

Belshazzar? For centuries this was a mystery for available Babylonian records mentioned

19:33

No king named Belshazzar as a result critics said that this proved that the book of Daniel was historically inaccurate

19:42

However during the 1920s the deciphering of more recently discovered Babylonian documents solved the mystery

19:48

These documents indicated that Belshazzar was the son of King Nabonitis The second problem is this if Nabonitis was king during the events of Daniel chapter 5

19:57

Then why does verse 1 called Belshazzar Belshazzar King some Babylonians documents solve this problem as well?

20:04

They indicated the following in 555 BC Nabonitis marched an army westward

20:11

To conquer rebels who had revolted against the Babylonian rule since the death of Nebuchadnezzar Before he left

20:17

Babylon on this trip this expedition Nabonitis entrusted kingship to his oldest son

20:23

Belshazzar Though through time Nabonitis built a royal palace in the distant town of Turna or Tima in The heart of the

20:33

Arabian Peninsula long ways from home, and he settled there well Nabonitis retained the title

20:39

Maintained the title of king in Arabia Belshazzar exercised kingship in Babylon Many letters and business documents indicated that Belshazzar functioned as the real authority in Babylon Thus a co -regency situation existed and Daniel was perfectly accurate in calling

20:57

Belshazzar king So it was not uncommon. We see that he threw a feast

21:03

Belshazzar the king held a great feast for thousands of his nobles I was amazed when I looked into this just what kind of feast they threw back then

21:11

They really threw parties The Greek historian Ctesias reports feast with 15 ,000 guests

21:21

That's like the population of Bonner County when I was a kid When Asher Sharma Paul to dedicated his new capital in Calais in 879

21:29

BC 65 ,000 574 guests were present at the feast of dedication

21:36

How would you feed them all I guess the now the last days of Babylon were chaotic Nabonitis had returned to Babylon and to deal with an internal rebellion while Simultaneously dealing with this besieging army

21:49

So while we're while we're reading verse 1 remember that encircling the walls of Babylon right now is the

21:55

Medo -Persian army They're outside the walls right now as we're reading verse 1 while Belshazzar is having his feast what

22:02

King throws a feast? While he's surrounded by an invading a very well respected and frightening foreign invading army so then

22:12

At the beginning of the following spring when Cyrus this is from this is from Herodotus.

22:19

This is Herodotus's Explanation of what was going on right now in Babylon when

22:26

Cyrus had punished the Guyanese he punished the Guyanese River by building canals and Dividing it among the 360 canals he marched against Babylon at last

22:35

The Babylonians sallied out and awaited him when he came near their city in his march and they engaged him, but they were beaten and driven back inside the city there they stored provisions for very many years and Because they knew already that Cyrus was not a man of no ambition and they saw that he attacked all nations alike so now they were indifferent to the siege they were indifferent to the siege and Cyrus did not know what to do being so too long delayed and gaining no advantage so Cyrus is outside the walls

23:01

He's looking for ways in while they're having their feast Whether someone advised him in the dickety in this difficulty

23:08

Herodotus says or whether he perceived for himself what to do I do not know But he did the following He posted his army at the place where the river goes into the city and another part of it behind the city

23:18

Where the river comes out of the city and told his men to enter the city by the channel of the Euphrates when they saw

23:24

When they saw it to be fordable Having disposed them and given this command he himself marched away with those of his army who could not fight

23:31

And he when he came to the lake Cyrus dealt with it and with the river just as he had the Babylonian Queen Drawing off the river by a canal into the lake which was a marsh

23:41

He made the stream sink until its former channel could be forded When this happened the

23:47

Persians who were posted with this objective made their way into Babylon by the channel of the

23:52

Euphrates Which had now sunk to a depth of about the middle of a man's thigh Now if the Babylonians had known beforehand or learned what

23:59

Cyrus was up to they would have not let the Persians enter the city and Have destroyed them utterly for then they would have shut all the gates and opened on the river and mounted the walls that ran along the riverbanks and still

24:09

Caught their enemies in a trap But as it was the Persians took them unawares and because of the great size of the city those that dwell there say

24:17

Those in the outer parts of it were overcome, but the inhabitants of the middle part knew nothing of it all this time

24:24

They were dancing and celebrating a holiday which happened to fall then until they learned the truth only too

24:29

Well, so the Persians the Medes and Persians are surrounding the city Belshazzar's throwing a feast

24:37

Belshazzar's pride in the city was humanly well -founded But God had designs that would come to fruition that night

24:45

One can look at the insanity of Nebuchadnezzar and ascribe it to mental issues But the fact that it happened on God's timetable

24:54

Demonstrates that providence or miraculous power and the miraculous power of God was what disposed of Nebuchadnezzar's mental issues

25:02

One can also ascribe the fall of Babylon to military acumen But everything happened according to the timetable

25:08

God had ordered and this too is a testimony to the providence and miraculous power of the sovereign

25:14

Jehovah These are important aspects that should never be forgotten by the by the people of God of every age.

25:21

He is always sovereign Verse 2 when Belshazzar tasted the wine

25:27

He gave orders to bring the gold and silver vessels which Nebuchadnezzar Oh, are there any questions about the verse 1 of the introduction which took some time?

25:36

I'm sorry, but any questions? Verse 2 when

25:42

Belshazzar tasted the wine He gave orders to bring the gold and silver vessels which

25:47

Nebuchadnezzar his father had taken out of the temple Which was in Jerusalem so that the king and his nobles his wives and his concubines

25:55

Might drink from them so this was sort of a a method of a king showing superiority over the peoples that he conquered by Misusing their sacred objects.

26:08

There were many vessels in the temple of Marduk that had been taken from conquered nations Why did

26:14

Belshazzar choose only the vessels from Jerusalem much? Speculation has been applied over the years

26:20

So this proper probably occurred after Belshazzar and his nobles were already very drunk

26:28

He would have been seated likely on an elevated platform Where all of the other guests could see him the feast would have been attended by great amounts of alcohol

26:37

The word father here again is a term that is loosely used in ancient languages It could refer to the actual father a grandfather or a great -grandfather

26:46

It could refer to a legal ancestor such as the case where one might be the son -in -law Or grandson -in -law of a king, but Belshazzar was talking about Nebuchadnezzar He intended to desecrate the vessels by having everyone drink from them

27:01

The nobles the wives and the concubines were sub properly present for the subsequent orgy that would follow

27:10

Drinking bouts like this were common among the Babylonian Persian peoples Often they were accompanied by lavish feasts and included especially prepared dishes of unusual animals

27:19

Including ostriches camel horses and other animals So they would have butchered numerous animals for the dinner and they would have had immense amounts of alcohol ready

27:29

So when he tasted the wine, he was already drunk most likely and so he probably did something that normally he wouldn't have done and Had these vessels brought to the party for everyone to drink from verse 3 yes

27:50

That we're gonna find out no Daniel Daniel really rebukes Belshazzar, I mean what a brave man of course, he faced all kinds of things down, but No Belshazzar is is acting irresponsibly even by Babylonian Regulations and Daniel takes later on we'll see

28:13

Daniel will take him to task for that So they then brought verse 3 the gold vessels that had been taken out of the temple the house of God which was in Jerusalem and The king and his nobles his wives and his concubines drank from them so from the history of the

28:28

Babylonian concept Chronicles, we understand that Belshazzar as a boy would have been involved in the royal court of Nebuchadnezzar He would have been in Nebuchadnezzar's court and would have known

28:40

Nebuchadnezzar He would have been about 14 years of age at that time

28:46

Nebuchadnezzar died in 562 BC. So he would have understood some of God's dealings and Sanctions against his grandfather.

28:53

He would have known about Nebuchadnezzar's pride He would have known about Nebuchadnezzar refusing to honor

28:59

Jehovah as the Sovereign Lord Even after repeated admonitions from Daniel he would have known who

29:05

Daniel was he would have known all of this Just as you know the people in your history from 10 years ago 15 years ago you remember the presidents and you remember the senators and the

29:18

Legislators and the good the bad the ugly you remember them all if I named some of them you would know their names

29:24

This would be the same situation with Belshazzar. He knew what was going on.

29:29

He was no fool Well, he was a fool, but he was not stupid So he would have understood

29:35

God's dealings he would have seen his grandfather go into madness at God's Direction and then come back out of madness and have his kingdom restored to him

29:45

He would have known that the history of the Babylonians didn't provide that kind of mercy Generally when a king was deposed he was killed or he was killed to be deposed and in this one case

29:57

The king was deposed Set aside and came back seven years later He would have known all this

30:03

Verse 22 indicates and here's one of the things if we want to jump ahead real quick to verse 22

30:09

You can see some of the dealings that Daniel had with him Daniel says to Belshazzar when when

30:14

Belshazzar finally brings him in in verse 22 yet you his son Belshazzar have not humbled your heart even though you knew all this and Belshazzar knew better Daniel points it out

30:32

He probably had been told about Nebuchadnezzar's dream and the prophecy in the fall of Babylon to Medo -Persia

30:37

Hello, guess who's outside the gates? Medo -Persia Even more interesting is the fact that ancient sources show that Medo -Persian troops under King Cyrus had conquered the entire

30:52

Surrounding countryside outside of Babylon at least four months prior to the night of the feast

30:59

So the the conquering army is outside his gates They've subdued the entire area all that's left is

31:06

Babylon and he's drinking himself into a drunken stupor the irony was

31:14

This by the way, this would also explain why there were so many Babylonian officials in Babylon. They had probably been running ahead of the advancing army escaping them from to lose their heads and taking refuge in the city of Babylon So the irony is that on the night

31:32

Belshazzar was raising his fist at Jehovah by defiling the vests of the temple The conquering army was encamped outside the city of Babylon Showers in his commentary again says this he says it is a fact that Nebuchadnezzar had made

31:47

Babylon into a world Into the world's mightiest fortress the outer wall surrounding the city was so thick no battering rams or other instruments were sufficient to knock

31:59

It down remember explosives didn't exist back then Firearms gunpowder it was spears and battering rams and catapults and and such and such like that The presence of the second inner wall and numerous fortress towers and ramparts made any attempt to scale the walls suicidal as a result

32:16

Babylon appeared impregnable Belshazzar and his officials were convinced that the

32:23

Medo -Persians could not penetrate those amazing defenses Brothers and sisters translate that to today as we're as we're moving through this

32:32

Though the people that are destroying our country right now think they're inconquerable

32:40

Blessed is the nation whose God is the Lord. What is the reverse of that? Go ahead

32:49

Cursed is the nation Who's God who abandons the Lord? The time is coming when what happened in Babylon may very well happen today

33:00

It may when I say the time is coming. It's going to happen. It's just when it's a matter of when

33:07

Are we spreading the gospel as fast as we can are we? Demonstrating to the world outside that that it is

33:14

Jehovah God who is in control We need to be doing that. So rental showers continuing.

33:19

He says the presence of the second inner wall With numerous fortress towers and ramparts made any attempt to scale the wall suicidal as a result

33:26

Babylon appeared impregnable Belshazzar and his officials were convinced that the Medo -Persians could not penetrate those amazing defenses

33:34

But even if Babylon's defenses could keep the Medo -Persians outside the city How long the

33:40

Babylonians inside hold out against the blockade they would need food and water to survive preppers in 600 550

33:49

BC They would need food and water to survive the Babylonians had solved this problem as well

33:55

The walls of Babylon had been built over the Euphrates River. So there's the big river so they had a continuing supply of fresh water in Anticipation of a blockade by the

34:06

Medo -Persians the Babylonians had supplied the city with enough food to maintain its population for more than 20 years

34:14

That's a lot of food 20 years of food Ancient historians indicate that in light of these great preparations the people of Babylon laughed at the siege of their city by Medo -Persia so this explains why

34:29

Belshazzar was busy getting drunk when the largest one of the larger armies in the world was outside his gates in light of these historical factors

34:38

Reynolds showers goes on to say It seems rather obvious that Belshazzar decided to desecrate the sacred vessels of Jehovah for one major reason to show his utter contempt for the

34:50

God of Israel and his prophecy concerning the fall of Babylon The king was so confident of Babylon's defenses that he decided to challenge this

34:59

God His defiling of the vessels was his way of shaking his fist at God and saying you have said that Babylon will fall

35:06

To the Medo -Persians who are now encamped inside and outside our gates I am declaring to you that Babylon will not fall its defenses are impregnable

35:16

No one will be able to take it my actions show you what I think of your prophecy once again a

35:23

Pagan king was providing God with a splendid opportunity to demonstrate his sovereignty

35:30

So I actually finished there, but are there any questions about this or can Anything you have to observe about a comparison to what's going on today

35:40

Oh Surely No, Herodotus Herodotus goes on to mention that that that enemies from inside someone communicated to Cyrus to draw off the water from the

36:04

Euphrates and cause it to sink down and then they could get in under the walls in the Euphrates River Yeah would

36:13

Yeah, I I should have looked up this quote, but you know a

36:19

Nation can survive its enemies, but not the traitors from within It's much more elaborate and impressive than that the quote is but That's the gist of it.

36:31

The fact is it is a complete dismissal of God's Word and the truth of God's Word that leads to the downfall of nations

36:41

And in Babylon Daniel had already Demonstrated through the early years and the early in the middle in the late years of Nebuchadnezzar's reign the sovereignty of God Belshazzar had all of that information and he refused to believe it

36:57

Peter See I told you he said it much better than I did

37:13

Redneck renditions are usually not that good So we're gonna close a little early today, but I just wanted to remind us

37:23

If we need to pound anything home, it's it's two things. Is it God is always sovereign in every age in every situation

37:31

He will not be mocked. He will not be mocked Let us not be among those that even accidentally ignore his sovereignty or Accidentally, we don't mock him

37:44

But when we don't obey him it's the same as mocking him and so as we look at these and we're gonna get into the the fall of Babylon and then the further prophecies and and frankly a lot of commentators that I've read

37:58

Ignore a lot of this and they only focus on the prophecies the the ones in the early chapters and then from chapter 7 on They actually don't even comment on chapters

38:11

Three four and five and some of six but doesn't the scripture say that every word of scripture is profitable for doctrine for proof for correction for instruction for Us so that we might be fully equipped to live lives.

38:26

I'm again paraphrasing a redneck paraphrase of second of the book of Timothy But we are equipped to follow him by studying and understanding and believing everything that's in the scriptures

38:38

So before we close I didn't want this to be a more a lesson of simple

38:46

Application, but it's ending up something like that We need to be the people who demonstrate that we believe the

38:52

Word of God first That we trust the Word of God and that we live according to the Word of God Daniel did

38:59

Belshazzar didn't and Babylon fell Every nation can fall we like to think of ours as We always everyone who is in a nation that at least for for whatever reason starts out good likes to think of their nation as Lasting forever as eternal.

39:18

It's just not so only God is eternal Only God is eternal. Let's pray

39:25

Father it is a sobering thing to reflect on that the fact that your hand will be against those who are against you and So we pray

39:35

Lord For the salvation of souls in this nation that you would turn hearts inside You would turn the hearts of men for that is the only way for true

39:47

Repentance and revival we look to you. We look to your hand. We look to your sovereignty and we look to your word

39:54

That the Lord Jesus Christ might be lifted up in this nation in a manner in which he has not been for so long

40:00

Well, thank you for what you're doing in the lives of your faithful We trust you for what you're going to do and we look forward to it in Jesus name.